Play review: 'Tending', Riverside Studios
Critically acclaimed at Edinburgh Fringe 2023, ‘Tending’ is an urgently eye-opening and timely play about the experiences of NHS nurses. Written by El Blackwood, who also co-stars alongside actors Ben Lynn and Mara Allen, it is a verbatim enactment of interviews with over seventy nurses, conducted over a two-year period. On the stage are three chairs, and three actors in matching blue scrubs, but the minimalist set is instantly transformed by the absorbing narrative and skill of the acting, totally immersing the audience into its world. We are taken with them on the exhausting night shifts, during the nursing strikes, and in the ICU during the chaos of the first wave of Covid. We hear about the individual decisions to go into nursing, and from those who choose to leave, as well as those who commit themselves unconditionally to the profession. Throughout the performance, we learn of people’s favourite nursing memories, alongside the most painful. ‘Tending’ powerfully bursts any bubble m...
